Barn Burning
...ambles. When Sarty begins his story, he refers to the broken chair on which he is sitting as the “sorry residue of the dozen and more moves.” (P 163). Sarty does not know stability or a permanent home. The boy’s father burns down the barn of every plantation they visit, and they are incessantly exiled from each new home. Sarty grows weary of all the moving and the indecent way of life that he has known since he was born. While Sarty’s father burns down barns, and deliberately disrespects his employers, the worst offense done to his son is the emotional and physical abuse. Sarty feels trapped by his father and is forced to comply with Abner’s demands. During one of the trials Abner faces for barn burning, Sarty hesitates to defend his father. When they leave the store, Sarty remembers the way it feels when his father strikes him: “feeling no blow, feeling no shock when his head hit the earth” but later his mother yelling: “He’s hurt, I got to get some water and wash his . . . ”(P 163) Later on that evening his father yells at him for not answering quickly enough and accuses him of betrayal, and strikes him hard on the side of the head. Emotionally, the abuse Sarty takes is just as severe and we see how distant father and son are. He pressures Sarty to lie for him and tries to give him a guilt trip for not lying to the Justice of Peace when he scolds him. “ You got to learn. You got to learn to stick yo your own blood or you aint going to have any blood to stick to you . . . Do you know all they wanted was a change to get at me because they know I had them beat? Eh?” (P 164) We see with this statement the utter confusion that the father must cause his young boy. Sarty knows that his father is wrong but is told time and time again that the right thing to do is to lie no matter what. He is forced to the age of 12 to choose between betraying the man that he knows as his father, or doing what he know is right. Sarty’s hesitation to confi...